Curriculum Unit Plan
Eleventh Grade: ELA Writing
Unit # 1: Writing an Editorial
Overarching Question:
How does a writer craft an editorial to support a claim(s) in an analysis of substantive topics or
texts using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence?
Previous Unit:
This Unit:
Next Unit:
Writing an Editorial
Questions to Focus Assessment and Instruction:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
How do we develop a precise and knowledgeable claim?
How do we establish the significance of the claim?
How do we best organize an editorial?
How do we address counter claims in an editorial?
How do we use knowledge of audience to shape the
editorial?
How do we choose sources to inform our editorial?
How do we determine the most relevant evidence?
How do we incorporate sources into an editorial?
How do the processes we use to write an editorial transfer
to other ways of thinking?
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Intellectual Processes:
warranting a claim
inductive/deductive reasoning
metacognition
critical and creative thinking
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Key Concepts:
rhetorical strategies (logos, pathos, ethos)
objective/subjective explanation
audience and purpose
biases/prejudice
counter argument
connotation/denotation
tone
syntax
Unit Abstract
Students learn to craft an editorial to support a claim(s) in an analysis of substantive topics or texts
using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence. They read and respond to a complex
set of ideas or sequence of events to generate an editorial argument. Students develop a logical
organization that supports claims counter claims, reasons, and evidence. They learn strategies for
building cohesion, warrants, and concluding statements. Finally, students revise for a formal style
and objective tone appropriate to their audience and submit their editorials for publication.
Common Core State Standards
CCSS: English Language Arts 6-12, CCSS: Grades 11-12, Reading: Informational Text
Key Ideas and Details
1. Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make logical inferences from it;
cite specific textual evidence when writing or speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text.
• RI.11-12.1. Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text
says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the
text leaves matters uncertain.
2. Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their development; summarize the key
supporting details and ideas.
• RI.11-12.2. Determine two or more central ideas of a text and analyze their development
over the course of the text, including how they interact and build on one another to
provide a complex analysis; provide an objective summary of the text.
3. Analyze how and why individuals, events, and ideas develop and interact over the course of a
text.
• RI.11-12.3. Analyze a complex set of ideas or sequence of events and explain how
specific individuals, ideas, or events interact and develop over the course of the text.
8. Delineate and evaluate the argument and specific claims in a text, including the validity of the
reasoning as well as the relevance and sufficiency of the evidence. (Not applicable to literature)
• RI.11-12.8. Delineate and evaluate the reasoning in seminal U.S. texts, including the
application of constitutional principles and use of legal reasoning (e.g., in U.S. Supreme
Court majority opinions and dissents) and the premises, purposes, and arguments in
works of public advocacy (e.g., The Federalist, presidential addresses).
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9. Analyze how two or more texts address similar themes or topics in order to build knowledge or
to compare the approaches the authors take.
• RI.11-12.9. Analyze seventeenth-, eighteenth-, and nineteenth-century foundational U.S.
documents of historical and literary significance (including The Declaration of
Independence, the Preamble to the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and Lincoln’s Second
Inaugural Address) for their themes, purposes, and rhetorical features.
Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity
10. Read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts independently and proficiently.
• RI.11-12.10. By the end of grade 11, read and comprehend literary nonfiction in the
grades 11–CCR text complexity band proficiently, with scaffolding as needed at the high
end of the range.
CCSS: English Language Arts 6-12, CCSS: Grades 11-12, Writing
Text Types and Purposes
1. Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid
reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
• W.11-12.1. Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or
texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
• W.11-12.1a. Introduce precise, knowledgeable claim(s), establish the significance of the
claim(s), distinguish the claim(s) from alternate or opposing claims, and create an
organization that logically sequences claim(s), counterclaims, reasons, and evidence.
• W.11-12.1b. Develop claim(s) and counterclaims fairly and thoroughly, supplying the most
relevant evidence for each while pointing out the strengths and limitations of both in a
manner that anticipates the audience’s knowledge level, concerns, values, and possible
biases.
• W.11-12.1c. Use words, phrases, and clauses as well as varied syntax to link the major
sections of the text, create cohesion, and clarify the relationships between claim(s) and
reasons, between reasons and evidence, and between claim(s) and counterclaims.
• W.11-12.1d. Establish and maintain a formal style and objective tone while attending to
the norms and conventions of the discipline in which they are writing.
• W.11-12.1e. Provide a concluding statement or section that follows from and supports the
argument presented.
Production and Distribution of Writing
4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization, and style are
appropriate to task, purpose, and audience.
• W.11-12.4. Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development, organization,
and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience. (Grade-specific expectations for
writing types are defined in standards 1–3 above.)
9. Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection, and research.
• W.11-12.9. Draw evidence form literary or informational texts to support analysis, reflection,
and research.
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Range of Writing
10. Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research, reflection, and revision) and
shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of tasks, purposes, and audiences.
• W.11-12.10. Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research, reflection, and
revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of tasks,
purposes
Assessment Tasks
End of Unit (Summative):
Editorial
Formatives:
1. Identify claim, evidence and warrant in mentor texts
2. Identify rhetorical strategies used in editorials
3. Generate a claim
4. Support a claim with valid evidence
5. Demonstrate an ability to warrant a claim
Lesson Sequence
1. Read an editorial as a class; look for specific “parts” in the text you have already worked
with (e.g., thesis, claims, evidence, warrants, rhetorical strategies, etc.)
2. Examine the purpose and format of an editorial
3. Students will analyze mentor texts for the ”parts” and each text’s effectiveness
4. Students will generate and/or research current school, local, state and national policies
5. Each student will choose a policy that is interesting and important to them. (*Teacher will
need to check that the topics are substantive. A substantive topic will have multiple claims
and evidence to support it)
6. Students will develop their thesis, claims and counterarguments for their topics
7. Review ways to evaluate evidence with the class
8. Students will gather evidence to support each claim and counterargument
9. Students choose the most valid evidence for their editorial
10. Students will draft their editorials
11. The class will review rhetorical devices and which are most appropriate for an editorial
12. Revise editorials, looking for cohesion, warranting, appropriate tone and style and a
concluding statement
13. Edit editorials for conventions
14. Submit finalized editorials for grading
15. Discuss orally or in writing what elements of writing an editorial can be used in every day
thinking and writing
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Resources
http://www.nytimes.com/
Everything’s an Argument by Lunsford and Ruszkiewicz
They Say, I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing by Graff and Birkenstein
Teaching Argument Writing, Grades 6-12: Supporting Claims with Relevant Evidence and Clear
Reasoning by Hillocks, Jr.
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